Monday, October 31, 2005

The Big Hoo-Ha... over the death sentence of the 25 year old guy is really getting on my nerves. I was watching the news during dinner today and they were like,"The severity of the death sentence is totally unacceptable to us..."

As I mentioned before, it is exceedingly disrespectful of another country's laws to make comments like that. The news reported that the 25 year old guy's (let's call him the bloke from now on) legal counsel is appealing to the Singapore High Commission for the sentence to not be carried out. I shall be exceedingly disappointed if this request is granted. In any legal jurisdiction, all must be treated as equals. That's why we have the statue of that woman blindfolded outside the Supreme Court, holding the scales of Justice in her hands. The law favours no one. Everyone is treated fairly and equally in a jurisdiction of justice. If Singapore shows leniency to the bloke just because he's Australian, we will be setting a precedent, and a dangerous one I might add. The final message is equivalent to," Hey, you're Australian? Come break our laws and shit on our face while you're at it."

I have faith in the laws of Singapore. Imprisonment is given only if the offence is no longer one of the petty type, particularly where the offence is one that shows pre-planning and serious enough to warrant imprisonment, even for a day. (The "clang of prison gates" principle) The rotan is reserved for offences such as rape that are even more serious than that, those where legal detention is an insufficient penal penalty. The death sentence, is meted out to the most serious of all offences, murder and drug trafficking. Drug trafficking is indirect mass murder. A pre-requisite of drug trafficking offences is that you need to be carrying illegal drugs, AND a quantity that is over a certain amount. Any amount lesser than that would amount to drug-consumption or possession instead. Therefore, if you are convicted of drug-trafficking, the drugs involved are not a petty amount any more, they would be enough for consumption by probably 2 or more people.

If those drugs had gone on the streets, how many people will get addicted, or killed, or at least injured. Think about all these people. How many of them have wrecked families due to drugs, lost their jobs, broke the bank just to support their addiction? Drugs are dangerous because they can cause people to do things they would never have done if they were not drug-crazed. I would certainly be disappointed if the death penalty for the bloke was revoked. It means that our legal system is bowing down to pressure from overseas authorities, and justice can be negotiated and bought. These bloody Australian politicians are saying all that just to win them the next election anyway. They don't deserve the death penalty but they should be given the rotan for being the shameless deceitful hypocrites they are. Try our Singapore famous Changi Prison's char kway teow, mate.

On a more mundane note, I spent the day studying macro at home today. Finally finished my textbook reading. Gonna start on the mock exam and the tutorials tomorrow. My stupid lecturer still hasn't posted the solutions online like he promised. I'm going to see him on Wednesday to force him into reviewing my testpaper. He's owed me that review for 6 weeks and didn't reply all my emails. Growl!!!